Subject: Re: More on rcons performance woes: pmax profiling
To: Jonathan Stone <jonathan@DSG.Stanford.EDU>
From: Chris G. Demetriou <cgd@netbsd.org>
List: tech-kern
Date: 03/02/1999 15:48:53
Jonathan Stone <jonathan@DSG.Stanford.EDU> writes:
> >the code to do that's there now, and would be a reasonable way to test
> >the speed improvement gained based on scrolling multiple lines at once.
> 
> Sure, execpt that wont have much effect, unless we also widen the path
> which Bill Sommerfeld fixed last month.

False.  if the main cost is, in fact, the scrolling, then scolling
multiple lines at once via SUNSCRL (in the sun emulation, of course)
should definitely show an effect, even without any other changes.

of course, if you're using vtxxx emulation, that doesn't help you, but
the point is to see what kind of improvement you're talking about,
without going and implementing all of the buffering code.  doesn't
really matter if you use sun or vtxxx emulation to do that, i don't
think.


> >However, even if the notion of deferring input until you have a
> >certain amount, or whatever, before processing it/scrolling/whatever
> >is implemented, the existing 'sun' behaviour of allowing multiple line
> >jumps should stay the same.  it's a long-existing and well-documented
> >part of sun consoles.  8-)
> 
> s/Sun/Sun PROM/.  We dont _have_ to emulate Sun PROM consoles on
> non-Suns, or even on Suns, if we don't want to. We can just change
> the name;)

False.  Sun, not "Sun PROM."

Yes, if you're going to change the way the 'sun' emulation behaves
such that it's no longer sun-like, it should be called something else.
However, that's just kinda stupid; the point of having it be 'sun' in
the first place was something relatively easy, small, and simple to
implement, yet approximately standard.

There exist other emulation options.


Note that buffering input has nothing to do with the size of the units
in which you scroll when you do scroll.  it's quite possible to buffer
input in a way that's compatible (or at least 'effectively compatible)
with the sun console emulation.



cgd
-- 
Chris Demetriou - cgd@netbsd.org - http://www.netbsd.org/People/Pages/cgd.html
Disclaimer: Not speaking for NetBSD, just expressing my own opinion.